


Songs From the Metal World

by DeadTropeSociety



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game), Horizon: Zero Dawn (Video Game)
Genre: Androids, Canon Continuation, Ensemble Cast, Gen, No Beta. We die like Androids., Subfunctions, This Is Not Going To Go The Way You Think, Tribe politics, every sci-fi trope but the kitchen sink, new tribes, wait...no. That's in there too
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-10
Updated: 2020-03-10
Packaged: 2021-03-01 02:49:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23098126
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DeadTropeSociety/pseuds/DeadTropeSociety
Summary: Defeating HADES was only the first step to restoring GAIA and saving the world. Too bad he’s not the only subfunction out for blood, nor is he as dead as Aloy would like. A fall through unsteady ground grants Aloy the help she needs in rebuilding the AI while a broken focus leads them to a previously untouched ruin, where not everything is as it seems. Lucky for Aloy she has more allies than she knows, and not every subfunction is plotting her destruction.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 8





	Songs From the Metal World

**Author's Note:**

> Forgive the no beta tag. I really wanted to get this out for Elizabet’s birthday (or a day early) and so skipped on that oh so important step. Ah well, with any luck I’ll have one for the next chapter, but then again, when have I had any luck? *le sigh* 
> 
> See below for a long note on this crossover and how I’m not crazy. Don’t worry, I have no intention of writing a novel’s worth of notes at the end of every chapter of this novel. 
> 
> Trigger warning: The first half of this is a pretty in depth description of a panic attack. And the second half has the same character pretty near one the whole time. There is also gratuitous potty mouth. But hey, who wouldn’t have one in the end of the world?

# Songs From the Metal World

# Prelude:

# Songs To End the World To

* * *

* * *

January 13, 2066. 

If there was one thing Isa knew about his father, it was that he was a complicated and contradictory man. Every smile completely genuine yet laced with the slightest note of shark like danger; his every word both straightforward yet testing and dancing around a greater truth. His every choice seemed like it was made by the seat of his paints but Isa knew that at any given moment he had more plans in place then there were letters in the alphabet. 

And that, above all, is how he knew this could not be a mistake on behalf of the old bastard. Missing the transport to the last bastion of humanity during the flesh-eating robot apocalypse just because he left something in his room was not something Elijah Elis would do… Especially if it involved dragging his youngest son down with him. 

The same son who was already overworked, over stressed and just wanted a rest after two years of hell. 

All at once Isa could hear his own breaths coming quicker then the rebreather in his suit should allow. In and out. In andout. Inandout. His throat, his lungs, they burned… oh god they burned! There was a leak. There had to be. He could feel death coming, his vision blurring until he couldn’t recognize the hellscape he was in. Or was his visor just that fogged?

Isa sunk to his knees as he moved his hands down his body, trying find a leak he could not see. He heaved harder as he felt his life eking into the atmosphere. Was there even an atmosphere left now there were no plants? Or was it like living on Mars, so thin and sparse it might as well not count? 

The gravel felt so sharp digging into his knees, he was sure blood was pooling in the legs of his suit. He sat back on his behind, his hands pushing his knees so close to his chest, he could feel the fasteners of his suit digging into his ribbs. Isa was waiting for death, clawing for every atom of oxygen as his breath came inandoutinandoutinandout. 

“Isa? Isa, what’s wrong?” His dad, taking his helmet in his hands and jerking it up until Isa was forced to focus on his face. 

“…Leak…”

Why did his own voice sound so far away?

“What do your sensors say?” 

“Wha-?” Isa asked.

“Your HUD.” His dad said, taping a single knuckle against the side of his helmet.

“It doesn’t…” 

“There’s no leak, Isa. You’re having a panic attack.” 

Oh. That… that makes sense. 

“We need to get you out of it. Can you count fingers for me?” 

Isa nodded, trying and failing to calm his breathing. 

He started with his left hand.

One. Two. Three. 

No that’s not right. 

One. Two. Four. 

That’s not right either. Why couldn’t he get it right? He stared at his hand in confusion for half a second before the answer hit him. These suits. These fucking suits had not been made to order. 

His polydactyl finger had been crammed in with his middle finger, throwing his count off. He had too many fucks to give, his brother had often said. 

Ienzo.

Ienzo was in Elysium waiting for them and they would never get there. He would be stuck waiting forever. Alone. With only strangers to share his tomb. 

His tomb. Oh god they were going to die out here! Gobbled up by a HOURIS quicker then a milkshake at a kids party. 

He was having trouble breathing again as he tried to pull his glove off, almost in instinct, desperate to breathe. Inandoutinandoutininin. 

“My fingers, Isa. Count MY fingers,” his dad said, splaying his fingers in front of his face. 

“OneTwoThreeFour…” 

“Remember to exhale on each word.” 

“FiveSix.Seven. Eight…Nine… Ten.”

“Good. Again.” 

Slowly his breathing steadied and his vision returned. The dizziness fell away and all that was left was an empty numbness born of pure exhaustion. And oh god was he exhausted. So, so very exhausted. 

He slumped forward until his head was buried in his dad’s neck. The clunky helmets made the gesture awkward and the lack of skin contact stripped it of almost any comfort, but there was nothing else for Isa to do. It was as good as he was going to get for the rest of his short life.

“Dad?” he said after a moment of heavy silence. “I don’t want to die here. Not like this.” 

“You won’t Isa, I promise.” 

Isa just hummed. It was the end of the goddamned world and his dad decided to go with fairytale now? Why not when he was ten and Isa decided it was a good idea to ask outright if Santa was real? Or when he was six and asked if heaven was real after his mother’s death? Where was Elijah’s pretty lies then? But Isa was too drained to fight anymore, especially over something so stupid. Not when there was no chance in a non-existent hell that his dad would cop to it.

“Don’t make impossible promises. We’re going to die out here.” 

“Probably,” Elijah said, giving a crooked, knowing little smile. “But statistically speaking there's always a chance for unlikely events to take place. And just between you and me, I’m a master of pulling off the near impossible.” 

He sounded so sure, like the inevitable had different rules for him. Like the impossible was mealy improbable. What a load of horse shit! Like they weren’t going to die alone, suffocating in the airless void that was now earth. And that way was an infinitely better way to die then what would happen if the swarm got to them. 

His dad must have recognized the signs of his panic attack coming back for an encore because he stood up, pulling Isa with him. 

“Come on, I’ve got something cool to show you.” The older man said taking half a second to brush the dirt off his knees before taking off to the other side of the bunker. 

Holy shit. The old man would be the death of him. 

“Slow down! I just caught my breath!” Isa said before taking off after him, giving a little smile at his father’s laugh filling the comm in his helmet. 

Just behind the entrance to the Bryce Canyon bunker was a single wooden shed that wouldn’t have looked out of place used as a barn back when livestock still existed. It looked rundown and neglected, probably on purpose given the super top secret nature of this shit hole. He could see the dust motes dance in the air and settle over abandoned tools, paint cans, and who knew what else. In fact, the only thing that wasn’t an inch deep in inhospitality was what stood out the most. 

Isa knew next to nothing about cars, but even he could see that the one tucked inside was a work of art. Kept clean all this time by the best wax and self washing features money could buy, with vantablack racing stripes over a cherry red body, it was probably the last car to come off the line before the world decided it had better priorities then luxury sports cars that could break the sound barrier. 

“What the hell is a car like that doing in a place like this?” Isa asked, “Never mind. It has to be Faro’s. Fucking Ted.” 

“Fucking Ted indeed,” Elijah said, only half paying attention as he fiddled with something on his focus. 

“This is cool and all but what good is it going to do us?” Isa asked, pulling on the obviously locked door for emphasis, only to have it give way and let him in. 

“You hacked his car, Of course you can hack his car.” 

“Just get in.” 

Isa supposed there were worse things to do during the apocalypse then take Faro’s car for a joy ride, but a part of him found it a bit impersonal and anticlimactic for a last action. But he didn’t have the energy to argue and really, it didn’t much matter when so many hadn’t had the luxury of dying with someone they loved. 

The inside was just as opulent as he should have expected. Real black leather seats are far more comfortable and spacious then the single cot he had called his own in the bunker. Abstract designs splashed across the floor in a luminous paint that reminded Isa a little too much of blood… which was morbidly fitting. 

“Why don’t you pick the music,” Elijah said. 

Isa flicked on the radio ready to scroll through the probable millions of songs Faro had at his disposal. 

_…who’s in the bunker? I have seen too much. I haven’t seen enough. We’re not scaremongering; this is really happening!_

That one was a little too relevant for Isa’s taste. 

Skip.

_… doomsday clock ticking in my heart…_

Oh hell no. Skip.

_…end of the world as we know it, and I feel fi-i-ne!_

“What the hell is wrong with this man?” Isa said, turning the radio off in frustration. He needed an escape, not a reminder. 

His dad laughed, the sound bubbling out of his chest and filling the car as he turned on the hover feature and switched it over to manual. 

“I had forgotten about that.” 

“Forgot about what?”

“Actually torturing Faro wouldn’t have fixed anything, but do you really think Travis and I would let him forget for a single moment that he’s the one who killed the world?” 

At this point Isa should really stop being surprised at anything his father did. Really, he should.

“That is so petty and…” he breathed, pausing for a split second to search for the right word, “…glorious.” 

“I’m glad to have your approval,” his dad said with a chuckle, flicking some files from his Focus to the radio, “Now which do you want? Knights of the Black Death or Queen?” 

“What kind of question is that? Give me Freddy.” 

“I knew you had good taste. Now buckle up because we’ll be there in twenty minutes.” 

  


* * *

* * *

  


“This can’t be Elysium.” Isa said as his father turned off the ignition. He had been sure — so sure — that they were going to make a run for it. With Faro’s speed demon of a car they had a chance, slim as it was, to make it to Elysium before they shut the doors for good. Instead they found themselves outside of an old farmhouse that wouldn’t be out of place in wizard of Oz remake. 

“Of course not,” Elijah said, his voice soft as if he had just now realized what Isa had been hoping. “The door would have been sealed almost before we got in the car.” 

Isa stilled. Had his panic attack cost them so much time? Was he the reason he and his father had no hope to survive? They were going to die horrible deaths, leaving his brother alone, and it was all his fault. He could see it in his mind, the swarm was coming and…

“Isa,” his dad said, sensing his thoughts, “Stop it.” 

He took a deep breath and then another before focusing all his attention to the music. For a moment there was nothing but the sounds of Bohemian rhapsody, no thoughts just music, and he calmed. 

“Are you ready?”

Isa looked at his father. Well excuse fucking him for trying to keep his mind from shattering into a million little pieces from histories worst case of apocalypse driven anxiety.

“Yeah, what are we doing here anyway?” he said, getting out of the car.

“You’ll see.” 

Elijah put his knuckles to the red door and started knocking like he was the police, which was kind of odd given how there were no police anymore…or even people to call them. But then again, Isa’s exhausted mind figured, if you can’t be polite in the end of the world, when can you.

If Isa was smarter he would have long ago learned to stop being surprised at the kind of shit life threw at him. That fate was not his friend and didn’t give a shit that there was no way he could get into the bottle of Valium through this suit, no matter how much he needed it.

“Cutting it a little close there Elis, don’t you think?” 

Isa’s dad just gave the young woman a sure little smile. “Would have been a lot closer if not for Faro.”

She gave the car an appreciative once over before stepping aside and motioning Elijah inside. 

“Well at least he’s good for something.” 

A small part of Isa’s brain registered that he should follow him, but a much larger part was still trying to wrap itself around the sight before him. The woman was only a handful of years ahead of him, with dark hair pulled tight in a high ponytail, and a thin strip of pale skin peaking from above her well worn jogging pants… which Isa could clearly see because she wasn’t wearing a suit. 

No suit? No suit. WHY THE FUCK WASN’T SHE WEARING A SUIT??!!

“What the fuck?” he breathed, words heavy in his throat.

His dad stilled and sighed, walking that oh so fine line between understanding and no longer having the patience for Isa’s shit.

“Carla, if you wouldn’t mind?” 

With a roll of her eyes, she pressed two fingers gently to her right temple and in seconds her skin and had crawled like liquid over her body before retreating into the fissures between white and gray graphene nanoplates.

Hnnn… Okay. An android. That explains the lack of a suit. No need to breathe meant no need for oxygen.

She motioned for him to follow them deeper into the house and he did, mutely staring at the hair tie that now hung to her camisole through the sheer power of static electricity rather than in her hair…which she no longer had…

God he needed his meds!

He shouldn’t be surprised really. The older he got the more he came to realize that his father had a really eclectic collection of friends. Ex-cons, current prisoners, several world renowned scientists and at least one trillionaire. And these were just the ones Isa knew about. Compared to that, a synthetic woman was almost mundane. 

Twenty five years ago, there was one android for every four humans in the United States. A docile, subservient and most importantly cheep, working class that took care of all the day to day things humans had become too good for: housekeeping, soldiering, childcare, elder care, nursing, general labor and maintenance, and the list goes on. Everyone was happy. Except those hit by the staggering unemployment that rivaled the great depression…and apparently the androids. 

Isa had never really been sure how deviancy works, and from what he could tell, neither could anyone else really. But over the course of one week in November a half dozen years before Isa was born, the androids all woke up and realized that they were tired of humans treating them like shit. Over a century of Sci-fi had conditioned the human race to thinking that the inevitable uprising would have to be ugly and violent. They were wrong. 

The androids took a more Martin Luther King jr road then Malcolm X, not that that helped them too much in the end. Sure they got their equal rights on paper, but anyone who has studied a lick of human history knows what that is worth. Prejudice and fear and hate don’t go away that quickly, especially not when all humanity had to do was wait them out. 

Crumpling under the weight of countless lawsuits and a massive loss of public trust, Cyberlife went under and with it, the androids supply of new parts, more androids, and most importantly, the blue blood that powered them became harder and harder to find. They were effectively starved out until one in four became one in one hundred.

When the Faro Swarm started eating the world and hacking any technology in its way, well lets just say no one liked the idea that their neighbor could become a robo-zombie at any moment, shattering whatever fragile shred of hope they had left. By now they were almost all dead. 

But then again, so wasn’t the rest of the world so in the end it didn’t really matter.

Carla led them to the basement and sealed the door behind them. There was a hiss of air as actual breathable oxygen was pumped in. Without waiting for the pump to finish, Elijah pulled his helmet off and started stripping out of the rest of his suit. Isa followed, desperate for two things: his meds and to wipe away the sweat that had pooled around his fingers. 

It was obvious that she had been holed up here for a while and had planned to stay a while longer. A single bare cot was pushed against one corner and a dozen or so large crates, each nearly as tall as a human, lined the far wall. The lid of one hung slightly open and Isa could see packages of Thirium —the same blue blood androids ran off of and Isa could bet all of them were filled with the same. 

“Give me a second and I might just have something humans can eat. Just don’t look at the expiration date. It’s been a while since I had a guest.” Carla said, rummaging through a backpack. 

“What’s the expiration on that stuff?” Isa asked, motioning to the crates as he sat down on the cot, waiting and praying for the Valuim to kick in soon.

“Doesn’t have one. Not if it’s kept sealed,” Carla said, handing him a granola bar that had long been crushed in it’s package.

“So you have enough to last you for what? Forever?” 

“That depends on what I do with it,” She said with a smirk and Isa was left wondering what she meant but he could tell she wouldn’t answer, not with the way she turned her back to him and started talking to Elijah. 

“Did you get it?” Carla said, reaching her hand out, palm up.

“Of course,” Elijah said, flinging files towards her. Carla caught the data in her hand like a child catching butterflies. She cast her eyes over to Isa before motioning Elijah a few steps over and continuing their conversation in a whisper Isa couldn’t quite hear.

Whatever. Isa didn’t have the strength to care. With a few swipes of his Focus, he had some music playing, drowning out all thoughts of the inevitable. 

He must have been more worn out (or the meds worked quicker) then he thought, because the next thing he knew, he was hovering in that dark place that was not quite asleep and not quite conscious either. His playlist switched to a track that was, for some reason, much quieter than the others, allowing him to hear the rest of the conversation edge. 

_… hold on just a little while longer…_

“Minerva’s supposed to be done in fifty years. I’d set your timer for sixty just in case.”

“Sounds good. And what about you?”

  
_…fight on just a little while longer…_  


“I’ve got a few things left to do before I check out.” 

“Figured as much. But really, Elis, why did you bring that walking ball of anxiety with you? He’s only going to slow you down and time is already not on your side.” 

_…dream on just a little while longer…_

“Even I can’t plan for everything. Let’s just say a very important piece of equipment broke before I could get to him. Speaking of which, do you have the prototype?”

_…every thing’s gonna be alright…_

_…ev-v-ery thing’s gonna be al-right._

**Author's Note:**

> The songs used are Idiotequ by Radiohead, It’s the end of the world as we know it (and I feel fine)by REM, Doomsday Clock by Smashing Pumpkins and Hold on (just a little while longer) from the DBH soundtrack. 
> 
> I know I have this listed as a cross between DBH and HZD but I want to be clear on what you guys expect. The point of this fic is not only to serve as a continuation of HZD, it’s to explore how the existence of androids would shake the post-GAIA world given the relationship each tribe has with the old ones and machines. I swear I'm not pulling this out of my rear end. 
> 
> In the scanned glyph datapoint on the forbidden west, a carja scholar records some of the stories from those who have ventured into the forbidden west. Stories of blue blood drinkers and “youths pale as ash, all wearing the same face.” I read this and gave it only the briefest thought before moving on with my life and onto the next game in my library, DBH... Which happened to be about a race of people who all shared a limited selection of faces, drank blue blood, and, when deprived of their synthetic skin, were hella pale. 
> 
> *Insert galaxy brain meme here* 
> 
> It didn’t help that everything seemed to fit timeline wise, with the deviancy crisis happening when Elizabet was about 18. 
> 
> Given the hundred or so possible endings of DBH, it’s hard to pin down exactly which one I'm using as history for this story. As long as it is at least semi-good and all three protagonists survive, we’re good. I guess i’ll figure out more as i’m writing. 
> 
> But if you haven’t played DBH yet, that’s fine. I’m going to try and cover all relevant information within the fic. Feel free to ask any questions, just please don’t be mad if some of the answers are somewhere along the lines of ‘we’ll get to that.” 
> 
> That being said, this kind of monster plot takes a lot of set up. So, besides a small cameo, don’t expect to see any DBH characters until at least chapter twenty by my current outline. I know, please put away the pitchforks, but I do have some pretty interesting things planned for our favorit plastic people if you just have a bit of patience. (Refers to the star wars quote in the tags). 
> 
> As for how long it will be, I have the first third (20 or so chapters) extensively outlined and the rest is following along. I don’t know if all three parts will be posted as a series or as a monster fic (and I do love me some monster fics).


End file.
